Vietnam War

Vietnam War
Part of the Indochina Wars and the Cold War in Asia
Clockwise from top left:
  • American Huey helicopters inserting South Vietnamese ARVN troops, 1970
  • North Vietnamese PAVN troops in action, c. 1966
  • American marines using a flamethrower, 1967
  • South Vietnamese general Nguyễn Ngọc Loan summarily executing Viet Cong officer Nguyễn Văn Lém during the Tet Offensive, 1968
  • US Navy A-4 Skyhawk on a bombing run, 1966
  • Burial of civilians killed in the Massacre at Huế, 1968
Date1 November 1955[A 1] – 30 April 1975
(19 years, 5 months and 29 days)
Location
Result North Vietnamese victory
Territorial
changes		 Reunification of North Vietnam and South Vietnam into the Socialist Republic of Vietnam in 1976
Belligerents
Commanders and leaders
Strength

≈860,000 (1967)

  • North Vietnam:
    690,000 (1966, including PAVN and Viet Cong)[A 5]
  • Viet Cong:
    ~200,000 (estimated, 1968)[4]
  • China:
    170,000 (1968)
    320,000 total[5][6][7]
  • Khmer Rouge:
    70,000 (1972)[8]: 376 
  • Pathet Lao:
    48,000 (1970)[9]
  • Soviet Union: ~3,000[10]
  • North Korea: 200[11]

≈1,420,000 (1968)

  • South Vietnam:
    850,000 (1968)
    1,500,000 (1974–1975)[12]
  • United States:
    2,709,918 serving in Vietnam total
    Peak: 543,400 (April 1969)[8]: xlv 
  • Khmer Republic:
    200,000 (1973)
  • Laos:
    72,000 (Royal Army and Hmong militia)[13][14]
  • South Korea:
    48,000 per year (1965–1973, 320,000 total)
  • Thailand: 32,000 per year (1965–1973)
    (in Vietnam[15] and Laos)
  • Australia: 50,190 total
    (Peak: 8,300 combat troops)[16]
  • New Zealand: Peak: 552 in 1968[17]: 158 
  • Philippines: 2,061
  • Spain: 100–130 total
    (Peak: 30 medical troops and advisors)[1]
Casualties and losses
  • North Vietnam & Viet Cong:
    30,000–182,000 civilian dead[8]: 176 [18][19]: 450–453 [20]
    849,018 military dead (per Vietnam; 1/3 non-combat deaths)[21][22][23]
    666,000–950,765 dead
    (US estimated 1964–1974)[A 6][18][19]: 450–451 
    232,000+ military missing (per Vietnam)[21][24]
    600,000+ military wounded[25]: 739 
  • Khmer Rouge: unknown
  • Pathet Lao: unknown
  •  China: ~1,100 dead and 4,200 wounded[7]
  •  Soviet Union: 16 dead[26]
  •  North Korea: 14 dead[27][28]

Total military dead/missing:
≈1,100,000
Total military wounded:
≈604,200
(excluding GRUNK/Khmer Rouge and Pathet Lao)

  •  South Vietnam:
    195,000–430,000 civilian dead[18][19]: 450–453 [29]
    Military dead: 313,000 (total)[30]
    • 254,256 combat deaths (between 1960 and 1974)[31]: 275 

    1,170,000 military wounded[8]
    ≈ 1,000,000 captured[32]
  •  United States:
    58,281 dead[33] (47,434 from combat)[34][35]
    303,644 wounded (including 150,341 not requiring hospital care)[A 7]
  •  Laos: 15,000 army dead[36]
  • Khmer Republic: unknown
  • South Korea: 5,099 dead; 10,962 wounded; 4 missing
  •  Australia: 521 dead; 3,129 wounded[37]
  •  Thailand: 351 dead[8]
  •  New Zealand: 37 dead[38]
  •  Taiwan: 25 dead[39]
    17 captured[40]
  • Philippines: 9 dead;[41] 64 wounded[42]
Total military dead:
333,620 (1960–1974) – 392,364 (total)
Total military wounded:
≈1,340,000+[8]
(excluding FARK and FANK)
Total military captured:
est. 1,000,000+
  • Vietnamese civilian dead: 405,000–2,000,000[19]: 450–453 [43][44]
  • Vietnamese total dead: 966,000[18]–3,010,000[44]
  • Cambodian Civil War dead: 275,000–310,000[45][46][47]
  • Laotian Civil War dead: 20,000–62,000[44]
  • Non-Indochinese military dead: 65,494
  • Total dead: 1,326,494–3,447,494
  • For more information see Vietnam War casualties and Aircraft losses of the Vietnam War
FULRO fought an insurgency against both South Vietnam and North Vietnam with the Viet Cong and was supported by Cambodia for much of the war.

The Vietnam War (1 November 1955[A 1] – 30 April 1975) was an armed conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia fought between North Vietnam (Democratic Republic of Vietnam) and South Vietnam (Republic of Vietnam) and their allies. North Vietnam was supported by the Soviet Union and China, while South Vietnam was supported by the United States and other anti-communist nations. The conflict was the second of the Indochina wars and a proxy war of the Cold War between the Soviet Union and US. The Vietnam War was one of the postcolonial wars of national liberation, a theater in the Cold War, and a civil war, with civil warfare a defining feature from the outset.[52] Direct US military involvement escalated from 1965 until its withdrawal in 1973. The fighting spilled into the Laotian and Cambodian Civil Wars, which ended with all three countries becoming communist in 1975.

After the defeat of the French Union in the First Indochina War that began in 1946, Vietnam gained independence in the 1954 Geneva Conference but was divided in two at the 17th parallel: the Viet Minh, led by Ho Chi Minh, took control of North Vietnam, while the US assumed financial and military support for South Vietnam, led by Ngo Dinh Diem.[A 8] The North Vietnamese supplied and directed the Viet Cong (VC), a common front of dissidents in the south which intensified a guerrilla war from 1957. In 1958, North Vietnam invaded Laos, establishing the Ho Chi Minh trail to supply the VC. By 1963, the north had covertly sent 40,000 soldiers of its People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN), armed with Soviet and Chinese weapons, to fight in the insurgency in the south. President John F. Kennedy increased US involvement from 900 military advisors in 1960 to 16,000 in 1963 and sent more aid to the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN), which failed to produce results. In 1963, Diem was killed in a US-backed military coup, which added to the south's instability.

Following the Gulf of Tonkin incident in 1964, the US Congress passed a resolution that gave President Lyndon B. Johnson authority to increase military presence without declaring war. Johnson launched a bombing campaign of the north and sent combat troops, dramatically increasing deployment to 184,000 by 1966, and 536,000 by 1969. US forces relied on air supremacy and overwhelming firepower to conduct search and destroy operations in rural areas. In 1968, North Vietnam launched the Tet Offensive, which was a tactical defeat but convinced many Americans the war could not be won. Johnson's successor, Richard Nixon, began "Vietnamization" from 1969, which saw the conflict fought by an expanded ARVN while US forces withdrew. The 1970 Cambodian coup d'état resulted in a PAVN invasion and US–ARVN counter-invasion, escalating its civil war. US troops had mostly withdrawn from Vietnam by 1972, and the 1973 Paris Peace Accords saw the rest leave. The accords were broken and fighting continued until the 1975 spring offensive and fall of Saigon to the PAVN, marking the war's end. North and South Vietnam were reunified in 1976.

The war exacted an enormous cost: estimates of Vietnamese soldiers and civilians killed range from 970,000 to 3 million. Some 275,000–310,000 Cambodians, 20,000–62,000 Laotians, and 58,220 US service members died.[A 7] Its end would precipitate the Vietnamese boat people and the larger Indochina refugee crisis, which saw millions leave Indochina, of which about 250,000 perished at sea.[56][57] 20% of South Vietnam's jungle was sprayed with toxic herbicides, which led to significant health problems.[58]: 144–145 [59] The Khmer Rouge carried out the Cambodian genocide, and the Cambodian–Vietnamese War began in 1978. In response, China invaded Vietnam, with border conflicts lasting until 1991. Within the US, the war gave rise to Vietnam syndrome, an aversion to American overseas military involvement,[60] which, with the Watergate scandal, contributed to the crisis of confidence that affected America throughout the 1970s.[61]

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  56. ^ Cite error: The named reference Falk-1973 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  57. ^ Cite error: The named reference Chiarini-2022 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
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